Terra Nova
Primary: Tau Ceti Position in System: 5th of 9 Number of Moons: 2 (Diana and Artemis) Biology: Terraformed, Introduced Left-Handed Amino Acid bias; Broadly compatible with Earth-based forms Total System Population (Including all system settlements): 3,617,430,000 Year of First Exploration: 2071 Year of First Settlement: 2077 Other Notable System Settlements: Scorch (Tau Ceti I): Domed mining colony Inner Asteroid Belt: Asteroid settlements, mining enterprises Diana & Artemis: Terra Nova's two moons, domed and lava tube settlements Located surprisingly close to Sol, Terra Nova was swiftly divided primarily between the major powers on the UN High Council. The blatant spoils system would prompt the development of the current Bureau of Colonization and its method of awarding settlement rights. Terra Nova is a generally Earth-like world. It is slightly larger than Earth, also somewhat denser, resulting in surface gravity approximately 10% stronger. Five oceans cover sixty eight percent of the surface, with six continents making up the remainder, with the eleven colonies fairly evenly divided across the planet’s surface. The continents are mostly clustered in the southern hemisphere, with lonely Gagarin the lone significant landmass in the north. The Russian colony of Novayya Rodina dominates this landmass, with a number of smaller independent settlements and private holdings making up the remainder of the northern population. Terra Nova’s colonies spearheaded the Colonial Independence Movement in the 2140s and today are some of the more powerful extrasolar members of the United Nations General Assembly. Four of Terra Nova’s colonies are permanent members of the UN High Council, the most of humanity’s daughter worlds. The various colonies govern their own internal affairs, consolidating planetary defense duties to a nominal planetary government known as the Confederation of Terra Nova. The Terra Novan Defense Forces operate fixed fortifications and sublight warships across the Tau Ceti system, primarily concentrated around Terra Nova and her two moons, as well as more mobile forces concentrated in the system's inner asteroid belt. The Confed government also has oversight authority over the myriad of smaller settlements across the system, from ice farming operations in the system's Kupier belt to the major colonies on Diana and Artemis and the innermost planet, Scorch. The Confederation government has no direct representation in the United Nations General Assembly, although obviously the major colonies in the system all hold their own seats, and largely confines itself to security duties and facilitating trade. The world bears traces of terraforming by an unknown agency within the last two million years; indeed, a majority of life forms on the planet seem to be imported from Earth, showing signs of genetic tweaking. Studying the world’s ecology and how it has been adapted and evolved to Terra Nova’s unique conditions has proved invaluable in adapting and refining terraforming techniques in use across human space. The imported Terran biology has also provided human scientists to study life forms long extinct on Earth, even before humanity began to master technology. The unknown species that terraformed Terra Nova also tinkered with the DNA of a number of introduced Terran species, including a family of cave bears thought extinct on Earth well over a million years ago. It is unknown if this tinkering was directly responsible for the rise of intelligence in a species in the genre or this development was the result of natural process. Regardless, this development was undiscovered for nearly four decades after settlement, when British Commonwealth settlers discovered the late Stone Age settlement later known as Camelot. The Grizzly territory is largely restricted to the region claimed by the British Commonwealth, and have been incorporated into Avalonian civilization. While a large number of Grizzlies still live a largely primitive existence, with anthropologists gradually introducing them to high technology and civilization, several million have integrated into human society and are far from an unknown sight in Terra Novan government or in the United Nations Armed Forces. Colonies on Terra Nova Terra Nova is home to eleven major colonies, all settled by the dominant nations or supranational blocs that dominated Earth in the mid-21st century. While it is easy to assume that this was the result of political dominance, in actuality few other nations were capable of supporting an interstellar colony in the 2070s. It would only be near the turn of the 22nd century that humanity's deep space infrastructure grew to the point interstellar colonization efforts became affordable for smaller nations and non-national actors. Avalon Capital: Churchill Other Major Cities: Darwin, Greenfields, Avon, New Melbourne Population: 114,650,000 (Human); 74,342,000 (Grizzly) Avalon was settled by the British Commonwealth, which saw a resurgence after the EU Constitutional Crisis of the mid-21st century. Drawing colonists from Canada, the Pacific Anglo nations, and Great Britain, Avalon has a rich and varied culture. The colony occupies a large stretch of the primary southern continent, stretching along the western coast from the sub-arctic to temperate regions. The region is moist, with an overall average climate ranging from northern Canada through the American Northeast. Avalon is a full member of the UN High Council and enjoys excellent relations with its parent nations. It has a varied economy, producing computers and high quality manufactured goods for both the Terra Novan and wider market. It is also a major source of food for the planet, with significant fishing and ranching industries. New Manhattan Capital: Gotham City Other Major Cities: Rivermouth, Armstrong City, Roosevelt City Population: 93,450,000 New Manhattan is the first American settlement and gained its name through a tongue-in-cheek editorial in the New York Times. With the proposed American commitment to the Terra Nova project estimated at twenty four billion, and a settlement zone that primarily consisted of a single large island, veteran columnist Matthew Weinberger observed ‘This new Manhattan purchase is probably on par with the first, just with larger, generally shinier trinkets’. The name stuck. While settlers were drawn from all over the United States, the cultural flavor is very much dominated by the descendants of those from the New York megaplex and its suburbs. New Manhattan’s territory is dominated by a single large island and a peninsula on the same continental mass as Avalon, although it is further north than the British colony and shades from a temperate to sub-tropical climate. It occupies roughly the same size of territory as Greenland on Earth, just in a far more hospitable region. In terms of raw square kilometer, however, it is the smallest and most urbanized colony on the planet. Earth’s first city certainly influenced its namesake on Terra Nova, with a number of settlers from the tri-state area and an even greater degree of cultural influence from New York City. Baseball is as popular in the colony as it is in the United States on Earth, and MLBTN is the only off-Earth league generally considered the equal of the consolidated MLB of Earth. New Manhattan achieved political independence in the first wave of colonial governments, along with Avalon, and the two colonies have had a mutually beneficial relationship since the earliest days of settlement. The Terra Novan beanstalk touches down in Armstrong City, which is home to the largest spaceport on the planet. Novayya Rodina Capital: St. Ekaterina Other Major Cities: Zhukovgrad, Novayya Muscovy, Novayya Volgograd, Putingrad Population: 134,540,000 Novayya Rodina dominates the sole significant continental mass in Terra Nova’s northern hemisphere, a kidney-shaped continent somewhat larger than Australia. The climate is generally pleasant aside from the northwestern coast, which is often subject to severe winter storms coming off the planet’s northern ocean. With no other landmasses to slow down or disrupt storm fronts, these ‘wintercanes’ have resulted in the entire region being largely left a giant nature preserve. Winters in Novayya Rodina tend to be slightly cooler, but damper than planetary average, but nothing out of normal human tolerances. Indeed, the majority of the colony’s climate is more hospitable than Russia’s, a fact which causes no end of amusement to citizens of Novayya Rodina. The colony has had a rocky relationship with the Russian Federation in the past-from the earlier days of settlement, Moscow ‘encouraged’ intellectual dissidents and advocates of greater political freedom to move to the colony, in a somewhat misguided attempt to use the colony as a safety valve for domestic politics. Coupled with something of a ‘brain drain’ in the mid-2090s as a large number of middle-class and professional citizens moved to the colony, the Russians found themselves rather more economically dependent on their Terra Novan colony than they were comfortable. During the Colonial Secessions of the 2130s, Russia found itself allying with Brazil in an attempt to reassert their political control over their wayward colonies. A coalition of newly-independent Terra Novan states and political allies on Earth forced a diplomatic solution before too much shooting occurred, and relations have improved somewhat in recent decades, but Novayya Rodinans generally have the frostiest relationship with their sponsoring state of any of humanity’s first colonies. The economy of the colony is somewhat more focused on primary industries than many on the world, with timber gathering and mining both netting substantial profits. Modest industry supplies the colony with the majority of its needs, and it is also home to a number of UN Marine Corps training facilities. Charlemagne Capital: Nova Aachen Other Major Cities: DeGaulle, Adenaurberg, Simpatico, Nieuwgrens Population: 193,400,000 The settlement of Terra Nova came at an awkward time for the European Union. Domestic politics were still unsettled between the ‘old guard’ nations of Germany and France and the rising power of the eastern nations, and the British secession rocked the credibility of the super-state hard. The settlement plan for Terra Nova dictated that the Europeans couldn’t afford to divide its initial allotment into a number of smaller cultural zones, as some had advocated-they wouldn’t be economically viable in some cases, leading to fights between the different blocs in Brussels. Instead, the decision was made to put off ethnic colonies for future settlements and make the Union’s first colony a pan-European one. That said, the largest blocks of settlers came from France, Germany, Italy, and the Low Countries, and those demographic trends continue to this day. Charlemagne is an island continent, roughly the size of Africa, with a large India-sized island off the coast. This large stretch of territory comes with a trade-off, though-the continent straddles the equator and is dominated by large rain forests that even two centuries after settlement remain poorly explored and largely off-limits to human settlers. The colony’s population is clustered along the coasts, with small settlements dotting the interior where flora, fauna, and climate allow for it. Liangzhen Capital: Fusang Other Major Cities: Lao Tzu, T’ien Shan, New Shanghai Population: 213,500,000 Many predicted the 21st century would be one dominated by China, which at the dawn of the century was on a seemingly unstoppable rise to power. The circumstances of First Contact curtailed this somewhat, but the most populous nation on Earth would not remain behind the curve for long. By the mid-2030s PRC scientists and engineers were working alongside their Western rivals and comrades in reverse engineering recovered Peregrine technology, and Chinese taikonauts were among the pioneers of the outer Solar system. A Chinese settlement on Terra Nova was assured extremely early in the colonization effort, centered on the largest continent across an inland sea from Avalon and New Manhattan. Sharing their continent with the Iranian and Pan-Latin efforts resulted in cooperation with those two colonies early, and later efforts saw the development of fish farming and seabed mineral extraction in conjunction with the Americans and British. Despite often contentious relations between their respective parent nations on Earth, Liangzhen has from the beginning maintained a cordial relationship with New Manhattan and has a result avoided the sort of rivalry that developed between Omid and Esperance over mineral rights. Yamato Capital: Meiji Other Major Cities: New Nagasaki, Toyota City, Blossom Population: 114,305,000 Yamato was founded by the Japanese in a region of Terra Nova devastated in the recent past by recent (in geographical terms) by a series of volcanic events. While ecologically speaking the region is relatively barren, the geological activity has made the entire region rich in any number of industrially useful metals, from staples such as iron to economically significant deposits of the entire platnium group. The settlers took care to introduce additional Earth life that would not overly out-compete the surviving native forms, and after two hundred years the region has started to recover ecologically. Yamato, as one might imagine, is a major exporter of both raw materials and finished goods, especially electronics and heavy machine equipment. The Japanese government contracted with national corporations more than most, a harbinger of the corporate-run colonies that would later develop on some of humanity's newer colony worlds. While this has not resulted in Toyota or Sony actually running the Yamato government, it is more true than most that what is good for those corporations is good for Yamato. Gandhipur Capital: New Mumbai Other Major Cities: Apeejay, Asokapur, New Madras Population: 134,540,340 Gandhipur is viewed even today by most citizens of the Republic of India as a symbol of Indian prosperity in the 21st century. While the Chinese government lagged behind incorporating Peregrine technology and working with the UN in spreading the technological wealth, India was concentrating on perfecting mass production techniques for fusion reactors and high-quality solar paneling. Keeping in mind the lessons of the Middle East and the disproportionate power it wielded in the 20th century because of its energy reserves, New Delhi was determined to gain a similar benefit in the 21st. Profits from the manufacture of these systems were invested in improving the Republic's infrastructure and eventually establishing a robust space program. Gandhipur was the third colony awarded during the initial colonization period, and from an early time the government wasd determined to duplicate the homeland's success on this new world. Today Gandhipur is home to the majority of Terra Nova's power industries, including both fusion reactors and the production of microwave power sats. What little antimatter production that takes place on-world, normally for research purposes, occurs in Asokapur. The colony's cities are densely populated, with large swatches of agricultural territory and nature preserves seperating each megaplex. Gandhipur's mass transit systems are second to none on Terra Nova, and are a model of efficency that has been copied all over the United Nations and indeed by other species. Belo Horizonte Capital: Grandebacia Other Major Cities: Novo Macapa, Branzaga, Amarelar, Portoazul Population: 277,324,500 Belo Horizonte has a notable place in human history as the site of the only civil war in mankind's interstellar period. Brazil was generally considered one of Earth's great powers in the mid-21st century and a colony seemed to be a natural evolution of Brazil's ascension into the first rank of powers. The first few decades of settlement were perfectly typical for the story of Terra Nova-first in developers followed by infrastructure improvements and population growth. Soon Belo Horizonte was a self-sustaining colony, contributing to the Terra Novan and human economy. Unfortunately, chronic political instability in Brazil itself prevented the country from founding any additional colonies during the settlement of Elysium, Olympia, or Galileo. When the Terra Novan colonies pushed for independence, the Brazilian government pushed back, sending in ground troops to force the local government to stay aligned with Brasilia. The fighting only last a few months, when British and American naval vessels prevented Brazilian troop ships from reinforcing their besieged garrison forces. The resentment from the situation caused a split between the colony and mother country far mre severe than most and also pushed Brazil firmly into China's camp in the General Assembly. Esperance Capital: Andanza Other Major Cities: Nueva Bogota, Bolivar, Ciudad Rivera Population: 133,454,000 Sharing a continent with the Chinese and Iranian colonies on Terra Nova, Esperance has a long standing dispute with Omid over mineral rights in the shared New Alp mountain range. This dispute has generally never risen above sharp diplomatic protests and the occasional private citizen getting out of hand, but it is notable as the most significant dispute on a world otherwise almost boring compared to some of her sisters. Esperance is a fairly standard colony, the only child of the short-lived Pan-Latin Interstellar Colonization Board. Disputes between the leftist bloc dominated by Venezuela and Argentina and the more capitalist bloc dominated by Mexico and Chile resulted in a messy divorce that even before being granted formal independence left Esperance largely managing its own affairs. The settlement patterns across the plains and river valleys of the region had been too diffuse for any single Earth nationality to have a significant majority anywhere, and as a result the colony more quickly grew its own unique identity than many of the other Terra Novan settlements. Ranching and mining are both notable industries in Esperance, although the colony is notable as being home to the second division of the planet's baseball league and is a center of the planet's film industry. The coastline near the capital of Andanza is a popular vacation spot, with warm seas and beaches kept pristine through careful land management. Omid Capital: Sialk Other Major Cities: New Tehran, Cyrus, Ardeshiropolis Population: 113,546,000 The Republic of Iran, following the fall of the Islamic theocracy in the early 21st century, quickly established itself as a regional power in Central Asia. An educated populace and an economy diverse enough to survive the collapse of the oil industry enabled it to establish a respectable space exploration program in the mid-2040s, purchasing a number of interplanetary drives based on reversed-engineered Peregrine technology from Europe. Staking an early claim in the exploration of the asteroid belt, Tehran expanded into the ship construction business, opening a low-gravity yard in 2067 attached to their colony on Vesta. When Terra Nova was opened to settlement, Iran gained a slice of the new world by trading colony ships and transports to the other powers in exchange for things the new colony of Omid would need. Omid has a long standing dispute with Esperance, but this has not prevented it from creating a robust and diverse economy, specializing in ship-building and vehicle manufacture. Most of Terra Nova's sublight craft have been built in Omid over the last century, and while the Terra Novan orbital yards are operated as a joint venture by the planetary council, Omid is home to several gunboat and fighter factories, and has produced much of Terra Nova's planetary defense grid. Saladin Capital City: Qom-Baghdad Other Major Cities: Khalifa, Al-Megiste, Qom Ridyah Population: 77,405,000 The Arab League was still very much recovering from the collapse of the oil industry when Terra Nova was opened for settlement, however it recieved the final colonial grant for no other reason than it was the best remaining choice. Korea was still intergrating a north devestated by decades of Communist mis-management and none of the African states had as of yet developed sufficent infrastructure to support an extrasolar colony, although South Africa was close by the early 2070s. Baghdad felt the colony was an opportunity to showcase the newly developing sense of pan-Arab unity that had its roots in the Iraqi Renaissance of the early 21st century. The irony of naming the new colony after a Kurdish general was lost on everyone except the Kurdistan government. Saladin is located in a relatively dry region of the planet's surface, although the division of territory overall ensured that each new colony had plenty of arable land and natural resources. Somewhat less populated than the other Terra Novan colonies, Saladin has consciously attmepted to maintain the spirit of the Islamic golden age of the 9th through 11th centuries. Generally more socially liberal than the rest of the planet, Saladin is a popular tourist location, bringin in tourists from across civilized space. Category:Human